Environmental Protests – Business as Usual?

Over the past few weeks, we have seen a wave of
intensifying environmental protests across the UK and around the world. Most
recently, efforts have been focused at London’s financial sector, protesters
gluing themselves across bank entrances in a stance against ‘the corrosive
impacts of the financial sector on the world’. In the UK over 1000
demonstrators have been arrested since the 15th of April and more
than 10,000 officers have been deployed. But are these protests triggering a
response from politicians and businesses?

Extinction Rebellion, the group behind the latest
wave of protests, propose three actions to be adopted by the government in
order to save the environment. The first is to admit to the scale of the global
environmental crisis; the second is for the UK to legally bind themselves to
commit to net zero carbon emissions by 2025, and their final demand is for the
government to put together a Citizen’s Assembly, whose role would be to help
ensure that the goals are achieved.

Critics believe that achieving zero carbon
emissions in just 6 years is unrealistic. And whilst the government has already
been discussing a plan to aim for net zero emissions, their deadline had been
pencilled-in for 2050. However optimistic you may be, it’s hard to believe that
the government could achieve a goal 25 years ahead of their original schedule.

It therefore seems that if the UK is to get
anywhere close to meeting the demands of environmental pressure groups, then
the issue of climate change will need to be attacked from all angles. That is
to say, businesses will have to start pulling their weight in the struggle to
move towards a green economy.

Last week, 21 business executives told The Times newspaper that they backed Extinction Rebellion’s call to
action on climate change, including support from Unilever, The Body Shop and
green energy providers Ecotricity. Extinction Rebellion have recognised the
need to reach out to businesses and have set up a new platform named XR
Business, which they hope will help focus business minds into making more
environmentally conscious decisions, but ultimately many businesses are
unlikely to make major changes if these changes will eat into their profits.

16-year-old Swedish environmental activist Greta
Thunberg recently met with all major political party leaders in the UK, except
Theresa May, who sent Michael Gove on her behalf. Many of those supporting the
protests say that all too often environmental issues are swept aside, in favour
of short-term political and economic gains. It’s fair to say the Prime
Minister’s absence hasn’t helped to counter this view.

What is clear is that the climate crisis isn’t
going to be solved by politicians and policies alone, neither will it be solved
by a handful of businesses. A more fundamental change in the way we view the
environment is needed. Consumers will need to become more conscious in the way they
shop and in doing so businesses will follow suit. Extinction Rebellion’s
demands may be a little ambitious, but what’s important is they’ve got people
talking about climate change again. We can only hope that once the noise of the
protests dies down, we don’t all forget the cause for change. After all, there
is only so long that the environment can withstand ‘business as usual’.